Lander's Travels eBook

The sultan, however, contemplated other means of securing
success, placing his main reliance on his powers as
a mohammedan doctor and writer. Three successive
nights were spent in inscribing upon little scraps
of paper figures or words, destined to exercise a magical
influence upon the rebel host, and their effect was
heightened by the display of sky-rockets, supplied
by Major Denham. Tidings of his being thus employed
were conveyed to the camp, when the Mungas, stout
and fierce warriors, who never shrunk from an enemy,
yielded to the power of superstition, and felt all
their strength withered. It seemed to them that
their arrows were blunted, their quivers broken, their
hearts struck with sickness and fear, in short, that
to oppose a sheik of the Koran, who could accomplish
such wonders, was alike vain and impious. They
came in by hundreds, bowing themselves to the ground,
and casting sand on their heads, in token of the most
abject submission. At length, Malem Fanamy, the
leader of the rebellion, saw that resistance was hopeless.
After vain overtures of conditional submission, he
appeared in person, mounted on a white horse, with
one thousand followers. He was clothed in rags,
and having fallen prostrate, was about to pour sand
on his head, when the sultan, instead of permitting
this humiliation, caused eight robes of fine cotton
cloth, one after another, to be thrown over him, and
his head to be wrapped in Egyptian turbans till it
was swelled to six times its natural size, and no
longer resembled any thing human. By such signal
honours the sheik gained the hearts of those whom his
pen had subdued, and this wise policy enabled him
not only to overcome the resistance of this formidable
tribe, but to convert them into supporters and bulwarks
of his power.

CHAPTER XXIII.

Major Denham, who always sought, with laudable zeal,
to penetrate into every corner of Africa, now found
his way in another direction. He had heard much
of the Shary, a great river flowing into lake Tchad,
on whose banks the kingdom of Loggun was situated.
After several delays, he set out on the 23d January
1824, in company with Mr. Toole, a spirited young
volunteer, who, journeying by way of Tripoli and Mourzouk,
had thence crossed the desert to join him. The
travellers passed Angornou and Angola, and arrived
at Showy, where they saw the river, which really proved
to be a magnificent stream, fully half a mile broad,
and flowing at the rate of two or three miles an hour.
They descended it through a succession of noble reaches,
bordered with fine woods and a profusion of variously
tinted and aromatic plants. At length, it opened
into the wide expanse of the Tchad, after viewing
which, they again ascended, and reached the capital
of Loggun, beneath whose high walls the river was seen
flowing in majestic beauty. Major Denham entered,
and found a handsome city, with a street as wide as
Pall-Mall, and bordered by large dwellings, having